• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Who killed Cuban dissident Oswaldo Payá?

Fresh from the Cuban rumor mill: more on the “accident”
Fresh from the Cuban rumor mill: more on the “accident”

By Carlos Eire, on August 12, 2012

fotoautopaya.jpg

A rumor has begun to make the rounds, as is so common in Castrolandia. It is supposedly a leak from within the Ministry of the Interior, from someone who knows all the details of the "accident" that claimed the lives of Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero.

This anonymous source claims that Payá's car was indeed being tailed by two other vehicles and that it was forced off the road. But this is not all. The allegations being made by this anonymous insider are full of shocking twists and turns, both literally and figuratively.

In some ways, what this report claims sounds more credible than the two other versions of the "accident": 1. The official report that blames the Spaniard Angel Carromero for speeding and losing control; 2. The speculation that the car was driven off the road with the intention of killing its occupants.
This hypothesis is as close to the truth as it can be. Obviously this was an intimidation attempt that went south. This type of “accidents’ has happened before, in one case involving Paya’s VW van similar incident two weeks before the fatal accident, and Laura Pollán premeditate murder disguised as a mortal illness. The Castroit left wing regime version of the “accident “, is taking at face value, something that will not happen if it were a right-wing regime, since the Progressives, Lefties and the Mainstream Media would be screaming bloody murder demanding swift action and justice. But in the Castro brothers’ fiefdom it wouldn’t happen, like parrots they simple will toe the official line.
 
Of course this is the fault of the U.S. embargo against Cuba. If only we understood that a failed policy of 50 years must be stopped and all trade and tourism be opened up with Cuba, this would never have happened. Didn't Spielberg, the great moralist, tell us his eight hours with Castro were the most important hours of his life? Maybe it's all just Bush's fault. Hello people there are no coincidences under the Castroit regime.
 
As bad as this double murder is, it's not as bad as the massacre of nearly 40 people (including children) who were fleeing Castros’ paradise on the tugboat "13th of March." A number of survivors have testified to the atrocity, but nothing has been done, because practically anybody really care except for a few people.
 
Cuban dissident's widow does not buy accident story
Cuban dissident's widow does not buy accident story | Fox News Latino

EFE
Ofelia Acevedo, the widow of Cuban dissident Oswaldo Paya, once again on Wednesday rejected the government version that her husband's death in a car crash last month was an accident and renewed her call for an "independent" investigation into the matter.
All of Paya's relatives continue to be "very grief-stricken" over the death of the human rights activist and on Wednesday night a Mass will be celebrated for him in a private home in the Cuban capital, Acevedo told Efe in Havana.

Paya and fellow Cuban opposition figure Harold Cepero died on July 22 in a traffic accident near the city of Bayamo, more than 750 kilometers (465 miles) from Havana, as they were riding in a vehicle driven by Spaniard Angel Carromero. A Swedish citizen, Jens Aron Modig, was also in the car.
Payá’s family has long insisted that there’s evidence Carromero was rammed and forced off the road by another vehicle, presumably driven by the State Security agents who constantly tailed the respected dissident.
 
Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas and Harold Cepero Escalante: Murdered
Notes from the Cuban Exile Quarter: Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas and Harold Cepero Escalante: Murdered

Aron 1 translation: "Angel says a car pushed us off the road"
Friday, March 1, 2013

aron-1.jpg

Text of the Rosa Maria Payá press conference on February 28 at the FHC

Today my father would have turned 61 years old. Today my mother, my brothers and I will not have his always optimistic and hopeful physical presence. 221 days today that the parents of our friend Harold Cepero Escalante are living in the pain of never seeing their charismatic and young son.

My father and Harold found themselves immersed in the Peoples Path campaign that offers a way to move Cuba towards democracy, a path of reconciliation advocated by the majority of the Cuban opposition, a nonviolent option for freedom and prosperity of our people, given the lack of options of a government that has nothing to offer its citizens.
The evidence clearly shows that this was a set up assassination by the Castroit regime. They kill and spread the fear of death trying not to leave any evidence.
 
Crime and silence go hand in hand. The Cuban that not adds his protest against the sinister circumstances Rosa Maria Paya denounced in Spain would lack the most elementary human solidarity.
 
Ángel Carromero on the crash that killed Cuba’s Oswaldo Payá
Ángel Carromero speaks out on Cuba crash that killed Oswaldo Payá - The Washington Post

Opinions
March 5, 2013

Ángel Carromero, a leader of Spain’s ruling party, was visiting Cuba last July when a car he was driving crashed, killing Cuban dissidents Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero. Mr. Carromero was convicted of vehicular homicide; in December, he was released to Spain to serve out his term. This week he agreed to be interviewed by The Washington Post about the crash. Mr. Carromero, 27, holds a law degree and has taken a business course at Fordham University in New York.

What happened that day?

Oswaldo Payá asked me to take him to visit some friends, since he didn’t have the means to travel around the island. There were four of us in the car: Oswaldo and Harold Cepero in the back, [Jens] Aron Modig [of Sweden] in front, and me driving. They were following us from the beginning. In fact, as we left Havana, a tweet from someone close to the Cuban government announced our departure: “Payá is on the road to Varadero.” Oswaldo told me that, unfortunately, this was normal.

But I really became uneasy when we stopped to get gas, because the car following us stopped, waited in full view until we were finished and then continued following. When we passed provincial borders, the shadowing vehicle would change. Eventually it was an old, red Lada.
Angel Carromero had the courage to come forward and tell the truth of what really happened. He was held incommunicado in prison and the regimen state security made him confess under duress. The Castroit regime didn’t allowed Payá’s widow to speak with Carromero. She rejected the government version that her husband's death in a car crash was an accident and believes that Carromero is innocent.
 
Cuba dissidents crash death caused by second car: driver
Cuba dissident's crash death caused by second car: driver - FRANCE 24

06 MARCH 2013

photo_1362608675034-1-0.jpg
An undated photo released by Cuban TV via the Interior Ministry shows the crashed car of Cuban dissident Oswaldo Paya

AFP - A crash that killed dissident Oswaldo Paya in Cuba last year was caused when his car was hit from behind by another, the driver of the crashed vehicle asserted in an interview published Wednesday.

Angel Carromero told the Washington Post that a rental car he was sharing with Paya had been followed by a succession of vehicles after leaving to town of Varadero but the last one "began to harass us, getting very close."

"The last time I looked in the mirror, I realized that the car had gotten too close -- and suddenly I felt a thunderous impact from behind," said Carromero, a Spanish conservative youth leader.

"I lost control of the car, and also consciousness -- or that is what I believe, because from that point my memories are unclear, perhaps from the medications they gave me."
Relatives and supporters of Payá have steadfastly declined to put public pressure on Carromero or Modig to speak out on the crash, saying that they were victims of the crash just like Payá and Cepero.
 
Obama administration should urge a probe of Oswaldo Payá death
Obama administration should urge a probe of Oswaldo Payá death - The Washington Post

By Editorial Board,
Mar 13, 2013 11:47 PM EDT
The Washington Post

NELSON MANDELA was locked up on Robben Island. Andrei Sakharov was exiled to Gorky. Vaclav Havel was thrown into a Prague jail cell. Aung San Suu Kyi was repeatedly placed under house arrest. All of these courageous, dissident voices were muffled at some time by authoritarian regimes, but in the end, they found their way back to freedom. Oswaldo Payá of Cuba never got that chance.

Mr. Payá, who pioneered the Varela Project, a petition drive in 2002 seeking the guarantee of political freedom in Cuba, was killed in a car wreck July 22, along with a youth activist, Harold Cepero. The driver of the vehicle, Ángel Carromero, a Spaniard, was convicted and imprisoned on charges of vehicular homicide; in December, he was released to Spain. He told us in an interview published on the opposite page last week that the car carrying Mr. Payá was rammed from behind by a vehicle with government license plates. His recollections suggest that Mr. Payá died not from reckless driving but from a purposeful attempt to silence him — forever.
Cuban delegate tries to block UN testimony by Oswaldo Paya's daughter. US defeats objections by China, Russia, Pakistan, Belarus, Nicaragua. Daughter of famous Cuban dissident Oswaldo Paya cries foul play in his death; appeal for UN inquiry supported by 46 former presidents and world figures. Video from Youtube Human Rights Watch:
 
Sen. Bill Nelson calls for independent investigation in to death of Cuban dissident
Sen. Bill Nelson calls for independent investigation in to death of Cuban dissident | Babalú Blog

MEDIA ADVISORY: Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Request comes after Nelson’s meeting with Cuban opposition blogger

yoaninelson.png

Popular Cuban blogger Yoani Sanchez, seated third from right, visits Washington, D.C. One of her hosts was U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, seated to her right.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – On the heels of his meeting today with Cuban opposition blogger Yoani Sánchez, U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) called for an independent investigation into the car crash that claimed the life of another Cuban dissident, Oswaldo Payá.

Nelson made the call in a letter to United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon. In his letter, Nelson asked for an independent panel to investigate the events surrounding the death of Payá and youth activist Harold Cepero in the auto accident last summer.
In reality practically anything has change under the Castroit tyrannical regime. Basically it is the same dog with a collar of another color. Its repeat the same trick again and again, hiding the facts, barking and biting those that disclose them.
 
Unión Progreso y Democrácia (UPD) ask for international investigation about the deaths of Payá and Cepero
Video: Rosa Díez interview
March 25, 2013

 
Exposing a shady cover-up in Cuba
CARDENAS: Exposing a shady cover-up in Cuba - Washington Times

The truth about dissidents’ killings confronts the U.N.

By Jose R. Cardenas

More than 60 dignitaries and pro-democracy advocates from around the world have signed an open letter to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon requesting that the world body conduct an investigation into the tragic deaths of Cuban dissidents Osvaldo Paya and Harold Cepero in an automobile accident in July 2012. It’s the least anyone can do.

The letter was prompted by a tour of European capitals by Paya’s daughter, Rosa Maria, and the blockbuster revelations by Spanish political activist Angel Carrameo, who was with Paya and Cepero at the time of the accident. Now out of Cuba, Mr. Carrameo went public with the truth that the accident was caused by a Cuban state security vehicle that rammed the car in which they were riding, forcing it off the road into a tree. The two Europeans survived, but Paya and Cepero, sitting in the back of the car, were killed.

Since Paya’s death, his family has maintained the Castro regime was behind his death, which is hardly surprising to anyone with a sober understanding of the nature of that government. However, the regime moved quickly to silence Mr. Carrameo and another European activist who was present, Aron Modig, by setting up a kangaroo court, in which they were held responsible for Paya and Cepero’s deaths.
The UN should be investigating, since so many dignitaries have requested the investigation. The MSM is have not been paying the necessary attention to the tragic deaths of Cuban dissidents Osvaldo Paya and Harold Cepero. But of course the UN will no more address this than they will address other atrocities around the world.
 
Paya was an extraordinary pro-democracy man, with a wonderful family. His convictions were rooted in his catholic faith, and his strength came from being a humble follower of Christ doctrine of peace and forgiveness. He is another victim of the Castroit tyrannical regime.
 
Oswaldo Payá’s death must not be squelched
Oswaldo Payá’s death must not be squelched - The Washington Post

By Editorial Board
Published: March 3, 20131

WHAT WAS it about a simple petition drive more than a decade ago that so frightened Fidel Castro? Cuba’s constitution provides that a law may be proposed by citizens if 10,000 people or more sign a petition. The dissident Oswaldo Payá and others gathered 11,020 signatures by May 2002 on the petition of the Varela Project, what Mr. Payá said was “a citizens’ movement for peaceful change,” demanding guarantees of political freedom in Cuba. Then Mr. Castro’s state security went into overdrive. In what was called the Black Spring in 2003, some 75 of Mr. Payá’s friends and colleagues were rounded up and imprisoned, including 29 journalists. Many served years in squalid jails before being released.

They suffered for a document that is elegant and logical on its face but that profoundly threatened the Castro regime. First, the petition demanded guarantees of free speech and association. It declared, “These rights and all human rights existed before anyone formulated them or wrote them down; you and all your fellow men have these rights because you are people, because you are human. Laws do not create these rights, but they must guarantee them.” Next, the petition called for amnesty for political prisoners. A third section authorized private enterprises. Mr. Payá understood that economic and political freedom went hand in hand. Lastly, the petition called for competitive elections and candidates elected directly by popular vote, breaking the hold of the one-party state.
Practically nothing work or operates effectively, including health care, in the Castroit regime. It has lasted by being propped up previously by Russia and now by Venezuela. On a per capita basis the regime ranks among the greatest murderers of the communist regimes. The Castro brothers will go down in history with Mao and Stalin and Hitler as among the bloodiest tyrants and creators of misery of the 20th century.
 
Cuba dissident death probe call
Cuba dissident death probe call - BelfastTelegraph.co.uk

Belfasttelegraph.co.uk

PANews+BT_N0150121365819634941A_I1

Rosa Maria Paya speaks at the University of Miami's Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies (AP/Lynne Sladky)

13 April 2013

The daughter of a Cuban dissident who led one of the most significant campaigns for political change on the island says there is enough evidence for an international investigation into her father's death.

Rosa Maria Paya said witness accounts, text messages and statements made after a car crash last July involving her father raised questions about the Cuban government's official account. The crash killed Oswaldo Paya and youth activist Harold Cepero.

The two dissidents and another passenger were in a car driven by Spaniard Angel Carromero in Bayamo, Cuba, when he lost control and struck a tree, according to government authorities. Carromero was convicted in Cuba of vehicular homicide and returned to Spain to serve a four-year sentence.
Rosa Maria Payá holds the Castroit regime responsible for whatever may happen to her and her family.

A group of U.S. Senators met with Rosa Maria Payá in the U.S. Capitol on April 10, to reiterate their call for an investigation into Mr. Payá’s death last year in which he, and Harold Cepero, were killed in a suspicious car accident.
 
Change, unless it comes from the top, requires external support to hasten a transition to a free society. The time is ripe for the freedom lovers Cubans, in and out of the island, to prepare the conditions for the coming upraising against the Castros’ tyrannical military regime.

I won't try to excuse all Fidel and Raul Castro have done, but I want to make a few points.

- The Cuban revolution overthrew a brutal regime, replacing it with one in the interests of workers.
- Access to education, healthcare - especially in poor, rural regions - has greatly increased. These systems have been praised as among the best in Latin America.
- In the early days of the revolution, land was seized from foreign companies and given to workers and the state.
- Cuba has elections, and politics are highly participatory and localized.
- There is, within the country, an understanding that development pressures from the west require the use of a large state. If the politics and the economy are opened up, a situation like that of Hungary may occur.

Overall, if you want to talk about tyranny, talk about US trade sanctions, not about the Cuban government, which doing more to improve the conditions of everyday people than almost any other contemporary state.
 
Pay attention to the eye movement of Angel Carromero and Jens Aron Modig, and you can see how off screen they are reading something provided by their captors to “help” them in their statements. It is very obvious that they are being coached. On top of that their body languages tell how uncomfortable they are doing this.
 
One year after suspicious death of Cuba’s top dissident, 125 leaders urge U.N. to investigate
Issue 443 - UN Watch

FIRST TIME: APPEAL FILED AS OFFICIAL SUBMISSION TO U.N. HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL, WILL APPEAR ON AGENDA OF SEPTEMBER SESSION

Signatories include Archbishop Desmond Tutu, European Parliament VP, former presidents & foreign ministers, ambassadors, human rights activists and dissidents

UN Watch Briefing
issue 333

GENEVA, July 22 -- Marking the first anniversary of the suspicious deaths of top Cuban dissident Oswaldo Paya and activist Harold Cepero, more than 100 public figures from around the world today called on the highest officials of the United Nations to launch an international and independent investigation. (See full text below.)

paya_oswaldo.jpg

"Mounting and credible allegations that the Cuban government may have been complicit in the murder of its most prominent critic, a leading figure in the human rights world, cannot go ignored by the international community," implores the petition.

While leading officials in the U.S. and elsewhere have previously spoken out for an inquiry, this is the first time that the controversy will be officially part of the UN's agenda.

The manifesto was filed today as an official submission to the United Nations Human Rights Council by the Geneva-based non-governmental group UN Watch, which organized the appeal together with a fellow human rights group, the Cuban Democratic Directorate.

Under UN rules governing submissions by accredited NGOs, the appeal will be circulated to all delegates as an official UN document, and placed on the agenda of the Human Rights Council's upcoming September session, increasing pressure for an inquiry, and for Cuba to answer for the alleged killings.

High-level signatories of the appeal include Archbishop Desmond Tutu, European Parliament Vice-President Edward McMillan-Scott, Chinese dissident Yang Jianli, numerous former presidents, foreign ministers & ambassadors, MPs and human rights activists.

The statement calls on UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, and all 193 UN member states to support the call for an international investigation. Despite previous entreaties, neither Ban nor Pillay have yet endorsed an inquiry.

UN Watch has been among the leading voices at the UN for human rights in Cuba, often bringing dissidents to testify before the Human Rights Council.

In March, UN Watch brought Havana-based activist Rosa Maria Paya, daughter of the slain dissident, to testify before the Council, where she was rudely interrupted by the Cuban delegate.

In May, UN Watch revealed how Cuba used more than 400 front groups to cheat on its quadrennial UN human rights review.

The activist group noted the irony that UNESCO has just honored Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara by listing his works in the World Memory Register.

"Instead of the UN honoring Che Guevara -- a man of violence who boasted about his firing squads to the UN General Assembly -- the world body should really be honoring Oswaldo Paya, a man of non-violence and disciple of Martin Luther King," said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch.
One year has passed since the suspicious death of Payá and Cepero. And in the anniversary of their death we are still without answers. Payá was capable of collecting over 25,000 signatures for the Valera Project, an outstanding achievement under the Castroit tyrannical regime. He received the Sakharov Price from the European Parliament for his efforts on behalf of human rights and fundamental freedoms.
 
Carromero: Payá was murdered by Cuban secret services
Carromero: Payá was murdered by Cuban secret services - Cuba - MiamiHerald.com

From Miami Herald staff and wire reports
Posted 08/05/2013

Angel Carromero, who was sentenced to prison in Havana for the death of two Cuban dissidents in a car accident, said in an interview published Sunday by Spain’s daily newspaper El Mundo, which was subsequently reported by the news service EFE, that Cuba’s secret service murdered Oswaldo Payá.

Meanwhile, Ofelia Acevedo, Payá’s widow, said she hopes Carromero’s interview “will add clarity about the attempt on my husband’s life.”

In an interview with El Nuevo Herald Sunday night, Acevedo said that she and the rest of her family never trusted the Cuban government’s version of the accident.

According to EFE and El Mundo, Carromero also said that he is convinced that Payá and another dissident leader who accompanied him survived the accident. “The nurses and a priest,” he was quoted as saying, “assured me that all four of us were admitted at the hospital.”

Carromero recalled that on July 22, 2012, the day of the accident, he was driving to Santiago with Payá, Harold Cepero and Swedish citizen Jens Aron Moding, when he realized that a blue vehicle was following them, the reports said.
There is no doubt that the Castroit regime killed Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero since they have become a big political threat to them. As always happens, new faces will rise up and challenge the regime, and it would be defeated.
 
Crash Survivor: Cuban secret service murdered Oswaldo Payá
Notes from the Cuban Exile Quarter: Crash Survivor: Cuban secret service murdered Oswaldo Payá

Posted Monday, August 5, 2013

HaroldCeperoOswaldoPayaPalabrasdeOfelita.jpg
Murdered by the Cuban Secret Service

Ángel Carromero, the young politician of the Partido Popular (Popular Party) breaks his silence and speaks to the Spanish media (El Mundo) on August 4, 2013 about what happened on July 22, 2012 on a road in Bayamo, on the one year anniversary of the deaths of Cuban opposition leader, Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas and MCL youth leader Harold Cepero Escalante. Ángel first spoke of the events on that day to The Washington Post on March 5, 2013.

Below is a translated excerpt from the interview in El Mundo:
If this so call “car “accident” had occurred in a right-wing regime, the mainstream media would have automatically assumed it guilty from the first day. But after all the revelation of the evidence that has come out after Carromero was back in Spain and could talk freely, there isn’t absolutely no way they can question it now.
 
Spanish court turns a blind eye on Oswaldo Paya case
Spanish court turns a blind eye on Oswaldo Payá case - The Washington Post

By Editorial Board, Published: September 27, 2013

THE SPANISH National Court has dismissed a complaint from the family of Oswaldo Payá, the Cuban dissident (and Spanish citizen) who was killed in a car wreck in eastern Cuba on July 22, 2012. The family, seeking a credible and independent investigation, pointed to evidence that the car in which Mr. Payá was a passenger was intentionally hit from behind and forced off the road, killing him and youth activist Harold Cepero. At the wheel of the car carrying Mr. Payá was a Spanish politician, Ángel Carromero, who had come to Cuba to assist Mr. Payá, a leading voice for democracy. The death of Mr. Payá was suspicious, not least because of his role in challenging the Castro regime. It is a shame that the Spanish court has turned a blind eye.

Mr. Carromero was tried and convicted in Cuba on a charge of vehicular homicide, sentenced to four years in prison and later released to Spain to serve out the remainder of his term. In accepting Mr. Carromero back, Spain acquiesced to Cuba’s verdict. But Mr. Carromero did not remain silent. On the opposite page in March, he described in harrowing terms how he was browbeaten into accepting the Cuban version of events — that he was speeding, lost control of the car and hit a tree. Mr. Carromero renounced his testimony and statements in Cuba, including a video interview in which he was ordered to read lines written by a Cuban security officer. Mr. Carromero told us, and he has told others, that the car he was driving was rammed by a vehicle bearing Cuban state license plates.

In dismissing the complaint and refusing to conduct a new investigation, National Court Judge Eloy Velasco said that Carromero’s description of events is “juridicially incongruent” with the testimony he gave the Cuban court. Exactly right. Mr. Carromero had to leave the Cuban dungeon to speak freely. Why should this be a barrier to further inquiry? The judge also cited the lack of any witnesses who could confirm or deny Carromero’s account. Why not try to find out if there are other witnesses to the coverup? The Payá family’s complaint to the court quoted a text message, sent that evening to a friend abroad from Mr. Carromero’s cellphone, saying that someone had tried to run them off the road. That ought to be enough to warrant digging further. The Spanish judge also rejected the suggestion from Mr. Payá’s family that the case should be investigated under the principle of “universal jurisdiction,” that certain crimes are so serious that they can be pursued across national boundaries. The court has carried out such investigations; the case against Augusto Pinochet comes to mind.

Judge Velasco’s dismissal can only be seen as a desire not to examine Cuba’s dark side. But looking the other way will change nothing. Mr. Payá’s daughter, Rosa Maria Payá, has announced plans to appeal. Hopefully, other judges will be listening.
More than a blind eye, it is a political compromise to look the other way, in order to overlook the dark side of the Castroit regime.
 
Spanish judges of liberal leaning are known for abusing their judicial authority to exercise political power. Judge Eloy Velasco is well known as a liberal, with strong left- wind leaning, which could explains why the court in this case declined to act. In the case of the ex-president of Chile, Augusto Pinochet, the left-wing judge Baltazat Garzon indicted him under the principle of “universal jurisdiction”, which has been rejected by judge Velasco in the case of the death of Oswaldo Payá. Birds of a feather flock together.
 
15 months later in the midst of a human rights crackdown in Cuba
Notes from the Cuban Exile Quarter: 15 months later in the midst of a human rights crackdown in Cuba

We still remember and call for solidarity and an end to impunity

Posted by John Suarez
December 22, 2013


OswaldoPay%C3%A1HaroldCepero1erAniversario2013SMAL  L.jpg

Oswaldo José Payá Sardiñas and Harold Cepero Escalante

15 months later in the middle of a human rights crackdown in Cuba another sad anniversary is marked and the call for solidarity and an end to impunity in the suspicious deaths of human rights defenders Oswaldo José Payá Sardiñas and Harold Cepero Escalante continues.

Statement of the Christian Liberation Movement over Facebook:

"Yesterday, December 22. 1 year and 5 months have passed since the unclear deaths of Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero. We renew our call for an independent investigation, because it is just, necessary and also for an end to impunity. The Cuban people know it was not an accident, which contrasts with the regime's refusal to tell the truth, the complicity of other countries to hide and even coldness (including even the hot cloth or caressing equidistance of ears) ..."

Ofelia Acevedo, Oswaldo Paya's widow said the following in an interview with Univisión on December 22:/B]

"They ordered the killing of Oswaldo Payá. State Security had threatened Oswaldo Payá with death for many years (...). Cuba is a totalitarian regime, where the government decides, the halls of power, every minute of life of the citizens. No one in Cuba would dares to do this, to do such a barbaric thing if he did not have the support of the highest levels of the Cuban government. The death of Oswaldo Payá is linked to the highest levels of the Cuban government, " ...

Over twitter Rosa María Payá addressed what had been done to Oswaldo and Harold:

17 months ago on another Sunday, around this hour a Cuban government state security car rammed the car in which my dad traveled. Today marks 17 months, yes they were alive and well after State Security rammed the car. How did my father and Harold die?

Rosa María Payá denounces the Human Rights situation in Cuba
Video link: [video]15 months later in the midst of a human rights crackdown in Cuba [/video]
Seventeen months later after the suspicious death of Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero, after more than 100 public figures from around the world have called on the highest officials of the United Nations to launch an international and independent investigation, still the UN has done nothing to launch it. What a waste of organization.
 
E.U. policy toward Cuba must not overlook its human rights abuseshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/eu-policy-toward-cuba-must-not-overlook-its-human-rights-abuses/2014/01/27/a88482f0-8702-11e3-a5bd-844629433ba3_story.html

By Editorial Board, Published: January 27

AS AN island nation with a failed socialist economy, Cuba depends for its survival on those beyond its borders. Venezuela has been its principal patron in recent years, but trade with the European Union is also significant. The European Union is Cuba’s second-most important trading partner and biggest external investor; one-third of all tourists to the island each year come from E.U. countries. Outsiders can influence Cuba, at least at the margins, and they should take advantage of that leverage.

On Feb. 10, the foreign ministers of the 28 E.U. member states will meet in Brussels. On their agenda is whether to begin a negotiation toward a new “political and cooperation agreement” with Cuba, which is being pushed by Spain and some others. Before they rush into a new handshake in Havana, this is a good moment for Europe to take a stand for human rights and send a message to Raúl Castro and his brother Fidel that investments and aid are linked to progress toward democracy and an end to repression.

A decade ago, a visionary dissident, Oswaldo Payá, launched the Varela Project in Cuba, an initiative seeking a legal plebiscite on democracy, free speech and release of political prisoners. More than 11,000 people courageously signed his petition at the time — more than 25,000 back it today — and the regime reacted with cruel disdain. In the “Black Spring” wave of arrests and repression in early 2003, some 75 activists were sentenced to long prison terms. Wisely, the E.U. reacted with disgust to the crackdown, and relations with Cuba soured.

The European Parliament in 2002 recognized Mr. Payá’s effort, awarding him the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought, given each year “to honor exceptional individuals who combat intolerance, fanaticism and oppression.” The Web site for the prize notes that Mr. Payá was attempting to change Cuba using legal means, from within.
In July 2012, Mr. Payá was killed in a car wreck in eastern Cuba under suspicious circumstances, along with another activist, Harold Cepero. The vehicle in which they were riding was rammed from behind by a car bearing government license plates, according to the driver. There has yet to be an independent and credible investigation of the circumstances of the crash.

Before the E.U. foreign ministers act, they should read the Jan. 17 letter sent from Havana by the Christian Liberation Movement, of which Mr. Payá was a leader. It notes that there has been a wave of arbitrary detentions, beatings and suspicious deaths over the past two years and cautions that, in his recent gradual liberalization measures, Raúl Castro “grants privileges and permissions, but not our right to have rights.”

On Dec. 11, the European Parliament expressed concern about the human rights situation in Cuba and called for “an international and independent committee of inquiry” to investigate the deaths of Mr. Payá and Mr. Cepero. We hope the E.U. foreign ministers are listening to the parliament that honored Mr. Payá with the Sakharov Prize a decade ago.
Seventeen months have passed since the suspicion death of Paya and Cepero and no independent investigation have taking place yet. But the European Union is planning to start negotiations with the Castroit tyrannical regime without taking into consideration its human rights violations. What bunch of hypocrite politicians pretending to support human rights.
 
Gandhi, Marti and Harold Cepero’s nonviolent legacy
Notes from the Cuban Exile Quarter: Gandhi, Marti and Harold Cepero's nonviolent legacy

January 30, 2014

Under the pretext of defending freedom they are attacking it. Martí would say it like this: "The knife that is stabbed in the name of freedom is plunged into the chest of freedom". They should think if at the bottom of this attitude there is a real respect for freedom, because to say freedom, to be free, is not to snatch the freedom of others." - Harold Cepero Escalante, 2002

“Liberty and democracy become unholy when their hands are dyed red with innocent blood.” - Mohandas Gandhi


haroldcepero.jpg
Harold Cepero (January 29, 1980 - July 22, 2012)

The end of January for nonviolent resisters inside and outside of Cuba has new added meaning. The birth of Cuban national founding father Jose Marti is on January 28, 1853; while Cuban nonviolent martyr Harold Cepero was born a day later on January 29, 1980; and finally Mohandas Gandhi was assassinated on January 30, 1948.

Both Marti and Gandhi had a profound influence on the Christian Liberation Movement youth leader Harold Cepero and one of its founders Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas. All of these men died violently, but only one, Jose Marti, advocated violence as the solution to a political problem: the question of Cuban independence.
Like in the case of Gandhi and King assassination, the assassination of Oswaldo Payá and Cepero, will make their legacy of nonviolent actions eventually successful in achieving their ultimate goal of a free Cuba against the Castroit regime in the face of brutal repression. It will attract international and domestic support, neutralizing the security forces of the regime, allowing achievement of their ultimate goals in the political struggle.
 
Back
Top Bottom